


It's the Little Things

by tobinlaughing



Category: Marvel's The Avengers, The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Squee, small fans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-20
Updated: 2013-02-20
Packaged: 2017-11-29 22:49:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/692454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tobinlaughing/pseuds/tobinlaughing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jane Foster hates book signings. Unfortunately Thor loves them, and can force her to go by the simple act of picking her up and carrying her to them. Their agent prefers that he not do it that way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's the Little Things

Dr Jane Foster is in hell.

It's well-disguised, for hell: the sun is shining through the storefront windows and the air smells like expensive coffee; the rugs underfoot are thick, not too dusty, and have faded to a comforting reminder of their former color. She's even got a not-uncomfortable chair at a table that doesn't make her look like she needs a booster seat. No, the three key words in her hellish scenario are location, location, location. A fourth (or second, her brain natters: the first are not three words, they're one word, repeated thrice) might be people. Who said it? Doesn't matter, they were right: Jane's hell is other people.

She considers, just for a moment and not for the first time that day, blaming the entire thing on the man sitting next to her. (How much can we call him a man? her brain says. I've never asked about the Asgardian male pronoun. Plus he's not really sitting. He's entrenched. Hulking--no, we'll stay away from hulking. Something more regal. Stationed? No, enthroned--) and enthroned works, because Thor loves this kind of thing, loves this attention, and insisted on these tour dates so yes, Jane decides, this really is his fault.

The posters in the window are just huge copies of the cover of their book: a cheesy background of a star field with a comet streaking across, behind the overly-large letters that proclaim the title: Bifrost! (Theoretical and Practical Revisitation of the Einstien-Rosen Bridge Theory, by Dr Jane Foster and Thor Odinsson. Jane doesn't even want to think about the jacket photo. She still thinks with all the makeup they put her in, especially next to Thor, she looks like a vapid, useless porcelain doll.

There is particle data stacked neck-deep on her desk back at Stark Tower. There are repairs to no fewer than four of her prototype handheld scanners that need to be done, and she wasn't even allowed to touch last night's readings this morning before Pepper swooped in with coffee, a garment bag, and a small army of stylists bent on slathering a "public face" on SHIELD's most recalcitrant and reliable asset. The paper that started the book was almost simple to write, and its reception was predictable: outraged disbelief from half of the readers, optimistic and eager encouragement from the other half. As a scientist, you either loved the idea of a transdimensional portal anchored in a specific point in space, or you hated it. Jane loved the idea, and at first, loved Erik's suggestion that she expand the scientific data with some of Thor's observations about the Asgardian operations of the wormhole-creation device he called the Bifrost. As the tiny man said, she reflected, apres moi, le deluge: after she'd proposed the idea, Thor had jumped all seven-foot-three-hundred-pounds of hot Asgardian warrior-prince on board. Not for the first time, Jane was relieved that Thor was more than just a pretty, hammer-obsessed blood-lusty superjock from the back end of beyond; his education had been more than thorough in the science-magic that operated in his homeworld of Asgard. (Plus battlefield tactics and strategy, diplomatic policy and negotiations, and readin', 'ritin, and 'rithmetic, her brain reminds her) With Stark's gracious tweaking of JARVIS to act as Thor's personal transcription software, the god of thunder had waxed poetic, spiritual, scientific, and descriptive about his observation of the working side of Jane's theories.

And so, a book. And with a book, the PR nightmare that was book tours, signings, and talkbacks, complicated all the more by the fact that Thor was, at least now, a recognizable superhero and member of the Avengers Initiative. Jane would have been more than happy to let Pepper Potts handle all of the press for the book release, but when Thor saw the news footage of all of the costumed fans who showed up to buy their copies at midnight on the day it was released, he insisted on going out and meeting them. Over, and over, and over again. And now he was insisting that Jane come along, because not everyone was looking for his triskelion-emblazoned signature on the title page; some of these people were actual physicists with questions she was more suited to answer. Not that she was inclined to answer them (most of the time, she had to restrain herself from whapping them upside the head with the hard-backed volume, barking "Did you read chapter three? It's allll in chapter three!"), but it would never do to have her besmirch the Initiative, SHIELD, or Stark by being less than gracious.

Today was the last date in New York, and after the taping for a morning talk show and a political comedy show that afternoon, the tour would be done. She could get back to her lab in Stark Tower, get back to barking at Darcy (who would delegate her barks into orders for their bevy of lab assistants), get back to her repairs, her theories, her particle data, her work. The worst thing that happened on these book signings wasn't that she had to talk to the undereducated, simpering, slavering masses; it was that the only thing she was supposed to write was her name, over and over and over again. (She'd taken to scribbling obscure short formulae on the flyleaves, where other authors wrote "Best wishes" or something equally inspirational. Had she been Tony Stark, of course, the formulae would solve out to something clever: Greek symbols that spelled his name, or something like that. Hers were long-form versions of simple algebra. If anyone could read the writing, and stared at it long enough, they might someday realize all they had to do was solve for x. X wouldn't be any great scientific revelation, but it might amuse them for a couple hours).

The doors open, the people stampede in, and for the first hour they come in equal numbers to her side of the table and Thor's: bespectacled professors, giggling fangirls, shy physics students (a surprising number of co-eds stop for both Thor's signature and hers, and Jane is always surprised to her mumbled professions that she was somebody's hero), and little kids in pajama versions of their favorite Avengers' uniforms, who want Thor to sign a poster or photo while their moms graciously ask for Jane's signature in the book. (Jane and Thor had browbeaten their literary agent into making the bookstores allow anyone up to the meet-and-greet table, not just those purchasing the book--but assumptions died hard with a lot of New Yorkers, so a lot of copies of Bifrost! were probably going to end up as library donations or dust-collecters on a lot of bookshelves.) After that first hour, though, and into her second Sharpie marker of the day, Jane finds herself with a little more breathing room between signatures, because most of the autograph-seekers are lining up for Thor.

No one had advertised a kids' day, or anything like that, but on the last day of the signing tour, there are kids of almost every age lined up to the door, around the cafe tables, and almost out the door. More and more keep coming in, too, dolled up in costumes that ranged from a hat with a hammer and wings drawn on it, to full vacu-formed plastic replicas of Thor's battle regalia. Red capes are everywhere, but Jane also spots more than a few miniature Iron Men and at least three little boys dressed up as Captain America. Thor will be talking about this day for the next three years or so, she figured: he loved little kids (and to someone that topped more than seven feet in height, any kid--and short adults, like Tony Stark, could qualify as a "little kid"). He loves the simple, uncomplicated sense of awe they bring to everything, their joy and wonder in finding out that sometimes, things in the universe really do turn out to be as cool as you thought they should be. She'd overheard Rogers and Banner talking about it with her thunder-god early on in the book tour, how when a person grew up, you found out how things worked: that the clowns took their makeup and wigs off at the end of the day, becoming tired men with little to laugh about; that there was a man below a rail, making your favorite Muppet sing his songs (and the discussion had derailed a little there, while Banner struggled to explain Big Bird and Kermit to the mystified Thor and Rogers--proving his theory and process in a microcosmic demonstration). But when the Avengers went public, little kids who idolized superheroes got to meet them and find out that it wasn't just a guy in a wig, or some disenchanted operator with some controls and a microphone. Iron Man clanked around in the actual suit that weighed five hundred pounds, was actually powered by his artificial heart, and actually shot lasers out of his hands. Captain America actually threw his vibraneum shield to knock actual bad guys out of actual windows (and somehow, the idea that the bad guys were real, too, only made the existence of their heroes that much more epic). And Thor--Thor was an actual alien that could actually call thunder and actually hit people with his actual hammer!

Mjulnir makes an appearance at all the book signings, although isn't allowed in the sound studios while taping the talk shows because of the interference it causes with the camera equipment. It is the safest, wildest thing to bring with: the real Mjulnir, his favorite weapon, deadly to anyone who faced him, but incredibly unlikely to be stolen for the simple fact that no one else can lift it. Thor lets all the kids touch Mjulnir, though, holding it in his lap for them to run their fingers across the knotwork, the cracked leather wound around the haft, the flawless, perfectly flat planes of its stone head. For the brave ones who want to lift it, he held it out for them, keeping his fingers in light contact with the weapon so that it won't crash to the floor, and he giggles with them as they hefted the mighty Mjulnir, just like their larger-than-life hero.

The lines had finally trickle down to the last trio of kids with their mom: two little boys, an even littler girl, and their somewhat harried-looking mother, clutching a travel mug of coffee. Jane stands as they approach, stretches, and then offers the mom her chair, pulling it around to the front of the table. With a grateful murmur of thanks, the mom drops into the chair, and the little girl hides around the backside, peeking out, never taking her eyes off Thor. Jane sees him wink at her as she accepted another bottle of water from their agent (who taps his watch face at her; they have a taping to be at across town soon...). The little girl giggles a bit, then ducks further behind the chair.

The boys are overexcited, hopping up and down and yelling with disbelief and the unrelenting energy of seven-year-olds. Both wear pajama versions of their favorite Avengers' uniforms: tops and bottoms printed with Cap's star and stripes and Stark's arc-reactor (the triangular Mark VI, not the return to the circular Mark VII, Jane's brain noted) and plates. Thor signs a poster for each one and they push each other aside to touch Mjulnir, although despite their shouted jibes and encouragement to each other, neither one tries to lift it.

"And you, my dear lady?" Thor said, holding his hand out to the little girl. She was younger, maybe four or five, and despite her brothers' antics, hadn't moved out from behind her mom's chair. Mom pushed her forward, though, and Jane saw that she was dressed in a rather interesting hodge podge: a bicycle helmet with stickers--they looked like angel wings--pasted on either side; a gray t-shirt and a red cape (the distinctive "S" turned to the inside) pinned to the shoulders with two mismatched silver pins, probably appropriated from Mom's costume jewelry stash. The little girl carries an orange plastic hammer from a toy set in one fist, and in the other, a stuffed bear dressed (a little more convincingly) like Thor. Jane recognizes the teddy bear from SHIELD's "let's go all the way public!" marketing campaign: they'd been the hottest Happy Meal toy in McDonalds' history.

"We told her she should have dressed like Black Widow, but she didn't listen," one of the boys proclaims. "Yeah," the other one chimes in, "they don't make girl Thor costumes."

"Well, I think she looks just like a warrior," Thor booms, giving the little girl his winningest smile. "May I see your hammer, my lady?"

The little girl shuffles over and holds the hammer out by the tips of her fingers, too overawed to get any closer to her hero. "Goodness, what a fine tool," Thor murmured, running his hands over the orange plastic. "Does it have a name?"

The little girl murmurs something in a small, piping voice and her mom translates, "She calls it Hammer Girl. That's who she wants to be," she says, by way of clarification. "She wants to fight bad guys with her hammer, like you, but she wants to stay a girl."

"Ah, well, I think that's a fine idea," and Thor holds out his hand to her. The little girl takes it, her little chubby hand almost disappearing in his ham-fist. Thor draws her closer, so that she is standing by his knee--and Mjulnir--and he whispers to her. Her brothers shove each other to crowd in closer to hear, and even Jane, who has seen this scene before and knows what's coming, leans in a bit. "Do you know, I have a friend, who is a beautiful maiden and one of the finest warriors I know. Her name is Sif, and she has fought with me and saved my life many times. If she were here, you could see that she is a better fighter than me!" The little girl gives a half-gasp, half-giggle, and never looks away from Thor's face. Jane knows what she is feeling: Thor can be a compelling storyteller, and he has told Sif's story dozens of times on this book tour, always to the same effect. "Now, my lady Sif has trained and practiced since she was a little older than you to become such a renowned warrior. She practices every day, and she never lets anyone tell her that there is something she cannot do. She always did all the studies and movements that our teachers made her do, and she practiced everything many, many times over, and in the end, she has become much better than me or any of our friends in Asgard. Do you think you would want to be like Sif?"

The little girl nods vigorously, the bike helmet falling over her eyes. Thor tips it back with a gentle finger and another huge smile. "Then you must run outside and play every day, and practice running and getting strong every day. Have you begun in school yet?"

This elicits an actual verbal response, an eager, peeped "Yes!"

"When your teacher gives you something to practice, you must do your best at it, and not give up until it is done. That is what Sif did, and that is what my love the lady Jane does, every day." Thor smiles at Jane, and not for the first time that smile makes her melt inside. Her whole chest cavity feels like it is glowing and for just a second, she wonders if this is kind of what Stark feels all the time, with an arc reactor embedded in his chest. "My lady Jane is so very, very smart, and so very, very brave, just like my lady Sif. Do you think you can be smart and brave, so that you can become a great lady, like Jane and Sif?"

Now the little girl is bouncing, almost jumping on her heels, so eager is she to get Thor's approval. She nods hard enough to shake the helmet off her head, and a tumble of dark curls escapes. For a moment Mom steps in, removing the helmet and smoothing her hair down, before Thor continues. He holds out Mjulnir.

"Would you like to hold it?" he asks, and the little girl puts one hand on either side of his, gripping the haft, fearless now. Jane sees Thor's brow furrow for just a second, and a muscle in his jaw jumps as he clenches his teeth. What's wrong--

Thor lets go of Mjulnir for just a moment, the briefest three seconds as the little girl holds up the mighty hammer all by herself. There's no dip of sudden weight in her hands, and the hammer stays perfectly still in the air, not crashing to the floor (and probably through it) as it normally would. Thor's hand darts out to catch it before his concentration breaks and gravity takes over, and the little girl shrieks in delight.

Thor signs her plastic orange hammer, the cape on her Thor-bear, and her bike helmet before Mom ushers the three terribly excited kids out the door. The marker shakes in his hand as he does so, and when they have gone (after each gets a hug from their hero--Thor lifts each one up for a squeal-inducing squeeze, high off the floor), he downs three bottles of water in quick succession. Jane is boiling over with questions.

"What was that?" she bursts out. "How did--I thought no one else could--"

"I can't do it for very long," Thor slumps in the chair, head in his hands as though his head is throbbing, and Jane instantly regrets her interrogative tone of voice. The god of thunder might actually have a headache. "But I can ask Mjulnir to do things for me: come to my hand, fly at a foe, or, in this case, stay perfectly still for a moment, and if it is inclined to indulge me, it will. The standing agreement is that Mjulnir will remain at rest, on the ground and it will do it until I pick it up again. That is why only I can lift it."

"But--but, in the air...?"

"That is more difficult, and I need to fight the hammer to obey me. The hammer wants to be moving or at rest, not suspended in the air. It fights me." He looks up at Jane and smiles. "Though it is difficult, Mjulnir would not move for anything. Had the Iron Man flown at it, he would have crumpled like paper against it. For that little one, I judged the cost acceptable."

"And what is the cost?" she demands.

"The unholiest headache ever conceived," his smile droops wearily. "I will need to drink much tonight to banish this repulsive affliction. And perhaps...did I see a package of Darcy's delicious popping tarts in your bag?"

Jane laughs, despite her worry, and digs the foil-wrapped package out for him: strawberry, his favorite. "C'mon, thunder-god. If you think it will help, we can stop on the way to the studio for some cupcakes, too."

He brightens. "Your world is best enjoyed in the smallest things!" And a look passes between them, a precursor to a conversation they haven't had yet, but Jane suddenly feels that they will. But for now: "Yes, cupcakes would not go amiss."

"Alright. Let's get going."

**Author's Note:**

> My SIL, the lovely and talented twistedingenue, has been posting here for the last couple years, at least, and has a pretty thorough and occasionally hilarious body of work posted over at her archive. You should check her out if you haven't already.
> 
> xposted to my livejournal (yes, I still have a livejournal)


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